People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 October 1893 — HISTORIC AMERICAN TRIUMPH. [ARTICLE]

HISTORIC AMERICAN TRIUMPH.

Notable Visit of the Foreign World’s Fair Commissioners to North Dakota to View Harvesting Machinery at Work. Forty-five Deering Twine Binders, forming a procession half a mile in length, and steadily moving through a waving sea of wheat—such was the sight that greeted the Foreign Commissioners to the World's Fair during their recent famous visit to the bonanza farms of North Dakota. This imposing spectacle was witnessed on the great Elk Valley farm at Larimore, North Dakota, a farm comprising 13,000 acres or nearly 19 square miles, 10,000 acres of which formed one unbroken fenceless field of wheat. To witness this sight the distinguished spectators, oomyrising fifty foreign diplomats, World’s Fair Commissioners and representatives of the foreign press, together with an equal number of Americana, eminent in World’s Fair, Railroad and Commercial circles, had undertaken the discomforts of a thousand mile journev from Chicago; and the exclamations of delight and surprise, and the cries of “bravo" that rang out on the air showed thst their expectations were vastly more than realized. Sent here to study all things American, these gentlemen had been especially desirous of witness lug the methods in vogue on the much talked-of “bonanza" wheat farms. Four days before they had left Chicago as guests of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, along whose route from Chicago to St. Paul they had received one continuous ovation. From St. Paul through Minnesota and 1 North Dakota they traveled as guests of the Great Northern Railroad, and the farther north they traveled' the warmer and more cordial was their reception. Here at Larimore they found the climax of interest and the height of hospitality. They were met at their train and escorted to carriages by what seemed to be the whole population of the little city of Larimore, hesded by O. H. Phillips, the Mayor. Gov. Shortridge, and N. G. Larimore, the proprietor of the great farm which they were to see. Silently and almost breathlessly at first they viewed the mighty phalanx of machines; then quickly alighting from their conveyances they followed the machines on foot, eagerly peering into their mechanism as if bent on finding the secret of tholr perfect, automatic, almost noiseless action. For an hour or more they followed the machines, asking innumerable questions of Mr. Larimore and his sone, when they were called to one side of the field where scientific tests es draft were being made under the supervision of Mayor O. H. Phillips and Mr. C. H. Olmstead. The machines tested —the Deering Pony binder and the Deering Ideal mower—were remarkable because embodying the ball and roller bearings, such as are used in bicycles and bicycle sulkies. Twelve tests were made on each machine with a registered Osterheld & Bickmeyer dynamometer, each representing the draft involved in cutting a six-foot swath, 100 feet in length, in twenty to twenty-five seconds of time. The six cutting tests of the binder showed an average of only 298 pounds of draft. The six tests in which the machine was ruu in gear over the tops of the stubble just cut, known as the “rolling draft’’ test, showed an average draft of only 207 pounds. The Deering Ideal mower, a new machine also fitted with the bicycle bearings, in heavy grass showed a cutting draft averaging 120 pounds, and the rolling draft ninety-two pounds. The remarkably low draft—about half the draft of ordinary machines—shown by these figures for both machines was carefully noted by the astonished visitors as demonstrating the practicability of the bicycle bearings. Tht same Pony binder, drawn by two light mules, cut an acre of wheat in twenty-two and a half minutes. PAPER TWIX’S USED. A notable feature of the binder test was the use on the Pony binder of the Deeriug “paper" twine, made from a wood fibre. This twine, patented by William Deering & Co., bids fair to prove a Waterloo to the twine trust, for it can bo made and sold at prices considerably below those now paid for the hemp and sisal fibres. At the close of these tests the commissioners, together with a party of spectators, were tendered a good, substantial prairie chicken dinner by Mrs. Larimore and her neighbors. Toasts followed. Gov. Shortridge, Mayor Phillips and Rev. J. H. Keeley delivered eloquent addresses of welcome, which were responded to by D. M. De Peralta, of Costa Rica; Mr. A. Grineysky, the assistant Russian commissioner; Don Albert) Gomez Ruano, of Uruguay; Mr. Harry Vincent, of Costa Rica, ana Judge Atwater, of Minneapolis. Mr. Larimore also spoke. He said that by using the best methods and machinery he had reduced the cost of raising and marketing wheat to between (4.50 and (5.00 an acre. MR. APPLEBT SURPRISES THS COMMISSIONERS. Mr. John F. Appleby, the inventor of the Appleby twine binder, whose presence was a surprise to the commissioners, told of the history of his early struggles and the final universal adoption of his invention. He Aid a glowing tribute to Mr. W4lliam DeeMg, to whose enterprise he said the worla was indebted for the introduction and general adoption of the machine. Said he: “In 1879, when ths Deering Company made seventy-five of these binders, people smiled knowingly and predicted failure. The next year when Mr. Deering made 3,000 of the machines, the manufacturers of the old reaper and the wire binder said he was crazy. If he win crazy all the manufacturers of harvesting machinery who have been forced to follow his example have also become violently insane [laughter] and the millions of-farmers who now use the invention are fit candidates for a lunatic asylum.” [Laughter and applause.] The excursionists left for Alton and the great Dalrymple farms at 4 p. m., where they witnessed threshing machines at work on a crop of wheat that was cut from 77,000 acres by 190 Deering binders—a make that is used exeiiislvely by the Dalrymples. From Alton they journeyed to Fargo, where they were royally received and shown the marvelous result of western pluck, which in a season of hard times bad built a solid city of brick and mortar on the bed of ashes that had lain smoking there only ninety days before. From Fargo, the guests returned to Chicago brimful of enthusiasm over the wonders they had seen. A wisb editor wants to know why people say a man “feels his oats" when he only feels his rye.—Siftings. -The generous husband talks through his wife’s beautiful hat.-Galveston News.

It takes four years for a college to turn out a good student., but it frequently turns out a bad student in less than three months. —Texas Siftings.